Ballet star Carla Fracci has died

FLORENCE, ITALY – Italian ballet great Carla Fracci has died. The queen of Italian dance would have turned 85 in August.

Thanks to her extensive career and her acclaimed interpretation of several classical romantic ballets such as La Sylphide, Fracci became one of the most experienced and recognized interpreters of Romantic ballets. Her career highlights include Nijinsky, Giselle (American Ballet Theatre), and Complete Bell Telephone Hour Performances: Erik Bruhn 1961-1967.

She was best known for her performances in Giselle, and for dancing with partners such as Rudolf Nureyev, Vladimir Vasiliev, Henning Kronstam, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Alexander Godunov, Gheorghe Iancu, Giuseppe Picone, Roberto Bolle, and Erik Bruhn. In 2014, Fracci took part in documentary film, 29200 Puthod, l’altra verità della realtà, directed by Federico Angi biography of Dolores Puthod international painter.

From June 2009 to 2014 she was nominated Culture Assessor for the Province of Florence. In 1983, 2000, and 2003, Fracci was awarded three prestigious honors from the Italian Government, acknowledging her meritorious achievements.

“With her elegance and her artistic efforts, the fruit of intense work, Carla Fracci honoured our country – said President Sergio Mattarella -. I express my most deep-felt condolences to her family and to the world of dance, which has lost a precious and unforgettable figure today. Her extraordinary artistic and human qualities made her one of the greatest ballet dancers of our time at the international level”.